LOS ANGELES: Miley Cyrus feels ''alive'' when she returns to her hometown of Nashville because she can go out without attracting attention to herself.

Miley Cyrus felt "alive" when she performed karaoke with her friends.

The 'Hannah Montana' star recently returned to her hometown of Nashville, Tennessee, and loved being able to hang out with her pals and do the regular things she can't do when she's in Los Angeles.

She said: "I got on the plane to Georgia, and I was lying in my mom's lap and crying and saying, 'I'm so happy to be getting out of Los Angeles.'

"I went out every night with my friends. I did karaoke. I danced. All this stuff would've been such a big deal in Los Angeles: Who's she with? Why is she dancing? I felt alive and real. It's so much easier to know who you are when there aren't a thousand people telling you who they think you are. I felt like I was really figuring myself out. Usually I have someone whispering in my ear, but I was on my own."

However, although she enjoyed being with her friends, the 17-year-old singer-and-actress never felt she fitted in when she was growing up because she was so determined to be a star.

Miley - daughter of 90s singer Billy Ray Cyrus - told Harper's Bazaar magazine: "I never felt at home anywhere. I almost felt like I didn't belong because no one understood the singing or the acting. They thought it was glamorous, but they didn't see that it was work. I knew it was hard work because of my dad, and I never wanted that. I wasn't stoked to walk a carpet because that just seemed normal to me."